This year's athletics team has shown once again that Yeovil College is a dominating force in track and field by winning the overall South West Colleges Championships.

The men's team finished second in the male team competition. Notable performances came from Arian Haggett, who produced a devastating run in the 200m (23.1seconds) to win the race.

Track Captain Jay Hookins destroyed the field in the 400m in a time of 52.1seconds, remarkable not only because he had completed the London Marathon ten days earlier but also as had produced a good run in the 200m to finish second only ten minutes before.

The 400H produced a shock win for Richard Leach who had only hurdled once before.

A determined performance produced an excellent finish to win the A race before completing a double by taking the B-string 110h event.

In the distance events vice-captain Ian Patchett showed the value of hard training by front-running the 3km to win in just over 10mins.

Successes were fewer in the field, however. Ashley Howell jumped over 12m in the triple jump to finish while Mark Plowman cleared 1.55m in the high jump to finish a creditable fourth.

In the throws, captain Jon Bell was second in the hammer A (31.53m) with counterpart Phil Llewellyn winning the B event (23.76m).

Phil continued by producing a winning display in the discus and a silver medal in the shot putt.

Other notable performances came from newcomer John Warren, who finished second in the A shot putt. Yeovil won the relay with a 45.2seconds South West College record.

The women's team won half of the events they took part in. Captain Emily Bloxham was second in the A 100m (12.7s) and won both the A 100H (16.4s) and the B 400H (74.2s).

Gemma Hart, in the 100m B, recorded a new personal best time of 13seconds and followed up with victory in the A long jump (4.62m).

Hannah Slade, competing for the first time over the 400H, produced a time of 70.2seconds to win and 64seconds in the 400m to finish runner-up.

Leah Platt had an excellent day, winning the B long jump (4.03m) and 100H (18.1s) - as well as clinching silver medals in the A 200m (29.2s) and the high jump (1.35m).

Elaine Priest ran well to finish second in the 3Km and Emma Taylor produced excellent performances in both the 1500m and 3Km events.

But it was vice-captain Sam Backwell who produced the run of the day in the 800m, winning by over 20seconds and breaking both the college record (which has stood for 20 years) and the SW Colleges record. She was timed at 2minutes and 19.1seconds.

In the field events, the girls from Yeovil College won doubles in the long jump and triple jump where Kim Turner (9.84m) and Sarah Lawler (9.11m) dominated the field.

Sarah then continued to impress in the B Javelin (20.80m) while Kim won the B hammer (18.77m) in her first ever event.

The girls then won the relay by over a second to complete a very satisfactory day's work.